Desperate job seekers scammed

Pamela Mdenge said even though she had been deceived she would still continue to search for work.

A Khayelitsha woman says she was over the moon when she got a message saying she had been employed by the “Care Disability Children’s Centre” in Rylands.

Pamela Mdenge, who lives in Enkanini informal settlement, said she had been applying for work at many places without getting any feedback. But when she got the news that she got a job, she hoped her financial problems were over. Ms Mdenge said she was promised that she would earn R1 500 a week but first needed to deposit R170 into an account to pay for the work uniform. The 44-year-old mother of two said in that message she was given the address of the centre, however, when she got to Rylands she could not locate it. She then bumped into another woman looking for the same place. It was then that a man informed them that they had been scammed as other people had come looking for the same place and it did not exist. She said within a few minutes dozens of other women came looking for the same place as they had received the same message. She said there were over 30 women from all walks of life who came for the same job.

She said at first she was sad and angry that she had used her last penny to go to Rylands with the hope that she would be starting work. However, she said she was also relieved when she discovered that she was not the only one who had been deceived.

But she said that people should stop playing with people’s emotions and desperation.

“It might seem as if it is a small amount that I paid but when you add it up with other people’s money that is a lot. I want to warn other people that they should be aware about such things. My worry is how many people have been deceived. And if this person is not caught this is going to continue. I hope that the police can crack this and arrest this person,” she said. Ms Mdenge said she has been unemployed for sometime now and she gets piece jobs once in a while. She said whoever who was behind this knows that people are desperate for jobs. Ms Mdenge said the money that she paid might seem like a small amount but for someone who was not employed that was actually a lot of money and she could have used it to buy important household things.

But she said she would keep on searching for work and would not be discouraged. She said she would be more cautious now when job hunting.